Vicente Borja

Product re‐engineering process using an enterprise modelling architecture

Creation of new products from existing solutions (product re‐design) shortens new product introduction phases and reduces costs. The product re‐engineering process is a new approach to the realisation of substitute components without the benefit of original design process documentation or any other documentation relating to the component. Re‐engineering comprises stages which are potentially applicable to many industries. This research applies an enterprise modelling architecture to modelling the re‐engineering process, producing descriptions of the process from several different descriptive views, namely function, information, resource and organisation. This results in a more complete description of the process, in which the model itself may be used as a reference for the implementation of a re‐design process in a particular company. This research also shows how the information modelling constructs of CIMOSA can be used to meet the particular unique requirements of the process of re‐design.

A conceptual view on data-model driven reverse engineering

The effectiveness of process models is dependent on the data sharing capability of the CAE system that supports the design process. This assertion is considered in the context of design using Reverse Engineering (RE) techniques, where RE is considered to be a particular type of redesign. Two main categories of information are considered: product-related information, captured in product models, and details of manufacturing capabilities, provided from manufacturing models. This paper reports on conceptual work, which underpins the research and also presents details of a case study, carried out in an industrial context to verify the concepts.

Assisting design for manufacture using the data model driven approach

Abstract The data model driven approach argues that computer aided engineering systems should be based on information data models in order to properly support the concurrent design of products. These models are the foundation for database representations of products and factories, and enable information sharing across unlinked software applications that address different stages of the product life cycle. This paper presents a product data model capable of capturing product life cycle information, and in particular its utilization for representing manufacturing information is described. A manufacturing data model that depicts the capabilities of manufacturing cells in terms of their processes and resources is also introduced. The potential benefits of using these data models to support design for manufacture are shown through a case study. The case study includes implementation of the models, their utilization representing a product and three manufacturing facilities, and demonstrates their value in the redesign of a component.

Sensing, smart and sustainable product development (S3 product) reference framework

Enterprises must become ‘sensing, smart and sustainable (S3)’ to face global challenges related to local, national and global market dynamics. Therefore, reconceptualisation and redesign in these enterprises must accommodate emergent technologies, new practices and strategies. In this sense, enterprises have used new product development as a strategy for remaining competitive in the marketplace; thus, they can provide a new generation of products offering solutions to contemporary social problems and responding to changing consumer demands. These new-generation products are mostly technology-based and consider sustainable objectives. In this context, concepts such as sensing, smart and sustainable products (S3 products) have emerged to satisfy different social requirements. Therefore, this work focuses on providing a reference framework that presents a systematic process for the development of S3 products. This reference framework is based on the integrated product, process and manufacturing system development reference model. The main objective of this work is to fill the gap vis-à-vis the current lack of design roadmaps that permit the development of this new generation of products in S3 enterprises. The development of a reconfigurable micro-machine tool is presented as that of an S3 product.

Teaching Multinational, Multidisciplinary Sustainable Product Development

This paper describes a multinational program aimed at teaching processes and methods for sustainable product development using multidisciplinary project-based teams. The foundation course teaches processes for designing sustainable products and services, metrics and evaluation methods through a combination of lectures, project work, and examination of actual business cases. It is to be followed by courses on green manufacturing and pre-commercialization planning. The program features bi-national collaboration between the U.S. and Mexico, motivated by our shared vision for the development of sustainable solutions in a global context. The exploratory foundation course of the program, Design for Sustainability, was taught in Fall 2007 at the University of California at Berkeley with students and faculty members from 14 disciplines and three institutions: University of California at Berkeley (UCB), the California College of the Arts (CCA) in San Francisco, and the National University of Mexico (UNAM) in Mexico City. This paper describes the course content, project experiences, faculty evaluation and student lessons learned from the foundation course as well as a proposed three-phase strategy for future program development.

Applying a Design Process to Create a Reduction Platform of GHG in Industries

This paper describes the final results of a project aiming at addressing climate change by creating a GHG reduction platform for businesses with carbon management needs in global markets. The project was carried out during a New Product Development course in a bi-national program between The University of California at Berkeley (UCB) and the National University of Mexico (Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, UNAM) in Mexico City. The program features collaboration between the Engineering and Design Schools at UNAM and Engineering and Business Schools at UCB and the College of Architecture CCA. The project, The Carbon Collaborative (TCC) is aimed at consolidating and managing the wide variety of policies and instruments created by governments and environmental organizations to mitigate climate change, and the anthropogenic gas emissions emitted by industry in particular in the US and Mexico. Based on a web platform TCC will provide companies with information on carbon legislation and a centralized location to find transparent and certified methodologies for carbon emission assessment. The differences between the US and Mexican markets lead to advantages for each part. The US market is full of developed consulting enterprises, which is not the case in the Mexican arena, giving to TCC the opportunity of being pioneers to regulate and manage large and small emitters, government environmental agencies and ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) companies.Copyright

A Case Study in “Total Beauty” Design: An Experience Through Sustainable Product Design

Recent research on ‘engineering design’ is expanding to consider methods, tools and frameworks aimed at assisting designers in the process of developing sustainable products. Some of these new approaches highlight the importance and advantages of applying biology, chemistry and human-environment health, concepts and principles at the design stage of the product development process. The successful application of these approaches also requires overcoming a number of challenges. Two particular issues currently being investigated are: 1) the contradictory and sometimes misleading use of concepts regarding what a sustainable product is; and 2) the lack of sustainable parameters to evaluate how sustainable a product is. This paper presents a synthesis of the Total-Beauty theoretical framework, based on the study reported in a previous paper. Then, a process to redesign products using BioThinking, is proposed followed by its application in the redesign of a product. The process is original because it shows how the core concepts are considered in all the steps of a design process and not just in the specification and evaluation steps. The redesign is used as a case study to show its utility. The paper includes the synthesis of evaluation parameters based on BioThinking to both assess the sustainability of products, and compare the redesigned product against the original design. In the end of the paper, a discussion of the design process and the results of the case study will be presented.Copyright

Data Model Support to Assist the Concurrent Design of Injection Plastic Parts and Their Moulds

Product models come from the analysis of data requirements to support product design and manufacture. These models are implemented in databases aimed at providing information to software applications that assist the concurrent design of products. This paper presents the specifications of data models to assist the concurrent design of injection plastic parts and their moulds. The product models are original since they capture part and mould life cycle aspects using the same data structure. The models also link product functional information to the design process and consider the capacities of an injection machine. The paper introduces the underlined structure of the above mentioned data models and uses a case study to show their capabilities. Finally, some conclusions are presented.Copyright

Energy consumption analysis of ABS plastic parts injected in a hybrid injection moulding machine

ABSTRACT The energy analysis of injection moulding processes is influenced by complex interactions amongst the moulded part, its material, the injection machine, the process parameters and the environmental conditions. The availability of energy usage analyses that comprehend information on specific materials and machine kind is limited. This paper reports a study that estimates and analyses the power usage profile (PUP), the specific energy consumption (SEC), and the energy distribution at an operation level of two different injected parts made of acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene and produced in a hybrid injection moulding machine. The methodology followed by the authors incorporates an experiment carried out in an industrial facility. A large sample size, and data-acquisition and data post-processing processes to obtain an accurate PUP and SEC are used. A breakdown of the energy consumed by the injection moulding process of the parts studied at an operation level using Sankey diagrams is discussed. The study results are used to identify strategies to reduce the energy consumed by the processes. The methodology employed, and the strategies reported could be used with other plastic parts regardless of the material and machine used. The results reported are new experimental data useful input for theoretical models.

Sustainability Assessment of Products: A Comparative Study of Sustainability Assessment Tools

The number of existing tools, principles and approaches to assess sustainability in products is growing to meet industry and society needs. For those related to design and development in universities, research institutes and companies it is a fundamental issue to recognize features and details of the sustainability assessment tools in order to select the one that best fits their particular needs. This paper describes the outcomes of a product sustainability assessment carried out at Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, UNAM. The approach followed by the authors in this assessment was aimed at comparing the results provided by a set of software tools and a previous sustainability integrated-criteria tool developed by the research group.The main contribution of this paper is the insight on the software tools used and on the results of the assessment since the design point of view. The results of the assessment included metrics such as: carbon footprint, energy use, end of life potential, toxicity, eco-toxicity, human toxicity, recyclability, and others. In the first part of the paper, an introduction of the criteria and the software based tools for sustainability assessment used by the authors is presented. Then a justification of the tools used and an explanation on how the comparison was achieved are given. The product used as a case study and the results of its sustainability assessment are presented. The case study part is a home appliance subsystem. In the end of the paper conclusions, insights and further work are given.Copyright